


Sudoku

by TheGeniusCallsYou



Category: Stargate - All Media Types, Stargate Universe
Genre: Angst, Emotional Hurt/Comfort, F/M, Hurt/Comfort, Rush had better days, Temporary Amnesia of sorts, Whump, mind tricks
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2020-11-03
Updated: 2020-11-03
Packaged: 2021-03-09 01:08:00
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,892
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/27366304
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/TheGeniusCallsYou/pseuds/TheGeniusCallsYou
Summary: Nicholas Rush was like one, giant, brain-damaging sudoku which when one thought to have all figured out changed all the variables, leaving them in no better position when they had started, but when an accident during exploration of the newest part of the ship has dire consequences for the scientist the rest will have to do their best to help the man they had all thought to be an emotionless bastard.
Relationships: Gloria Rush/Nicholas Rush
Comments: 4
Kudos: 19





	Sudoku

**Author's Note:**

> Another SGU fic that just came to me out of nowhere and made itself comfortable in my head. Who am I to turn it down?

Nicholas Rush was an enigma. There was no better word to describe the man as to many people he was like one, giant, brain-damaging sudoku which when one thought to have all figured out changed all the variables, leaving them in no better position when they had started.

A Sudoku, a Rubik's cube - one of the two or a mix of both - Colonel Everett Young wasn't certain which was better suiting. 

One thing was sure, though - Rush just couldn't be plain and simple. He would antagonize almost everyone on the ship, call them idiots on best of days and leave almost everyone wishing him dead on the worst and yet, like to every rule, there were exceptions. Chloe and Eli seemed to be the only ones that Rush wouldn't bite the head off. Eli Young could understand - the boy was a genius, and to Rush, it must have counted a great deal, but Chloe? The girl was all too ready to beat the older man to plumb after her father's death, but ever since the Nakai, the two of them had been almost inseparable. If that hadn't been enough, the whole thing with doctor Perry had happened, and the rest of the crew just didn't know what to think of Rush anymore.

Colonel Young ran a hand through his shaggy, curly hair in exasperation, messing them more than they already had been. He knew he should probably cut it, but he had found out a long time ago that he couldn't care less that it wasn't at a regulation length anymore. He had a lot more critical matters to take care of than his hair. His main scientist being the primary one.

Young sighed and pushed himself from the couch, making his way towards the basin where his razor waited for him - the fresh stubble on his cheeks was beginning to get on his nerves. Putting the shaving cream on his face, he looked critically at his reflection. Had he always looked so tired? He had spent the last two days on Earth, but instead of relaxing, even if only mentally, he had decided it had been the perfect opportunity to look into Rush's past to make at least a little more sense of the man. He had come back even more confused than before.

_"Well, Professor Rush had always been demanding, that's for sure, but his classes had been one of the best ones. It's a shame he's not teaching anymore._

_"I wanted to enrol, but didn't make it, he gave me extra classes though. If you see him, can you say Simon said hello? He used to remember everyone, so it shouldn't be confusing."_

Rush's students had seemed to like the man, the couple of other teachers that Young has spoken to had described him as a quiet type, with a specific kind of humour that used to keep to himself and didn't tolerate laziness. The colonel could somehow picture that if he tried hard enough, but when some of them began to speak about the scientist's late wife that had been when Young had felt as if someone had pulled the rug from under his feet. Yes, the man's interactions with doctor Perry had been some proof that he could act like a normal, feeling human being, but for the love of him, Young couldn't picture Rush holding hands nor attending dinner parties with anybody. 

Young dried his face with a towel and satisfied with his work turned around to look for his jacket. He didn't make it even halfway through the room when the radio that he had left on the table cracked to life. 

_"Colonel Young. Come in."_

Scott's voice. Two sentences, yet it was enough for the colonel to know that something had happened. It was in the tone of the young man's speech - quick, out of breath and distressed. Scott was too young to be able to hide those emotions and was all too easy to read. He would learn, but it would take time, the colonel had been the same after all when he had started. Young felt his stomach clench, and his heart beat faster. With two, quick strides, he was by the table and snatching up the radio.

"Young here. What is it?"

"Sir. You're needed at the infirmary."

"What happened?"

He was by the door before he had finished the sentence, already punching them open.

"There's been an accident during the exploration of one of the unknown sections."

"Casualties?"

"Four wounded, sir. No dead."

Exploration meant that the science team had to be involved. Young could already feel the headache building in his skull. Of course, no one would inform him beforehand.

"Is Rush there? I need to speak with him."

The silence at the end of the line made him stop in his tracks. He waited, but no answer came, so he pushed the button on the radio, willing his voice to sound urgent yet neutral.

"Leutienet? Is Rush there?"

An unwelcomed feeling clenched his gut, icing his blood as he waited for an answer.

"Rush's one of the casualties, sir. TJ's working on him."

Young closed his eyes briefly, then resumed his walk at a greater speed.

"Understood. I'm on my way."

_Better be OK, Rush or I swear to God, I'll show you why you shouldn't go poking around the places you shouldn't have been._

*

The makeshift infirmary was in so much chaos that it was difficult to assess when one should stand as not to get in the way. Chloe hadn't known what to do with herself, at least not at first when still in shock with splatters of blood on her pink tank top and unfocused gaze. But then there had been a shout about not enough hands to help, and her body had moved without conscious thought.

It wasn't supposed to end like that. The lab that the science team had found wasn't supposed to be dangerous. They had enough on their plate without the ship itself turning on them. Chloe had been on her way to see Rush about the latest bunch of equations when the man in question almost knocked her over, coming around the corner. She had tagged along with him, listening to the quiet but secretly excited chatter that they might have found something that could be an archive of ancient knowledge at worst, and something even more crucial at best. Eli had almost bounced on his toes as he jogged, calling it the most significant discovery since the bridge.

They had found the room and with it the trouble. In the middle of it had stood what had looked like a prototype for the chair—Rusty and unfinished, surrounded by illuminated panels and weird-looking cables with sharp claws hanging from the ceiling. Chloe didn't know who had touched the wrong thing - maybe it had been one of the marines, maybe the science team, her or perhaps even Rush. It didn't matter as all of a sudden something had exploded and the wires had come to life. It all had been too quick - shots had been fired, someone had screamed, and then one of the clawed metal things had rushed in her direction, and she could only stand frozen in the spot looking at it, petrified. 

The wire didn't reach her. Instead, Chloe had felt someone barreling into her, pushing her aside. She had hit the ground hard with her shoulder and watched as the claw had grabbed doctor Rush around his middle before flinging him against the wall like a broken ragdoll. She had managed to crawl under one of the desks, covering her ears, wanting to disappear. It had all been like a terrible nightmare that she couldn't wake up from. 

And then it had all stopped. The shots, the wires, the light - it all ceased to exist. 

"Doctor Rush!" 

Chloe had scrambled away from her cover, her eyes widening the moment the whole room had come to focus. They were still wide open as she numbly tried to follow TJ's commands at what tool she should pass to her all while not being able to tear her gaze away from the pale and bloodied face of Nicholas Rush. Somehow, after being thrown against the wall, he had managed to crawl to the chair, stopping all the madness. Chloe didn't want to look down to the wounds in the man's middle that TJ desperately tried to stitch, but Rush's face looked so deathly pale one could mistake him for being already dead.

They didn't know what he had done to stop the machines. The chair had released Rush as soon as everything turned dark and there had been no one close enough to catch him before he had hit the ground, slumping from the chair. TJ had stitched him up, but couldn't tell if there would be any lasting damage not until he woke up. If he woke up...

Chloe looked around the mess, her eyes skitting over the other wounded. No one had died at least it was a relief.

"How is he?"

Eli's voice startled her, and she jumped a little, turning in the chair to face her friend. He was hovering at a distance, his face pale and shoulders hunched with hands deeply hidden in the pockets of his hoodie, one of his sleeves slightly torn up. He wasn't looking at her, and Chloe followed his gaze to Rush's still form.

"TJ said it's too early to say anything."

Eli didn't answer, and Chloe didn't expect him to. What was there to say?

"He saved me..." she whispered, not realizing she had said it aloud. "Pushed me out of that thing way. Why?"

When she turned around, Eli was just beside her, and slowly, reluctantly he put his hand on her shoulder squeezing.

"I don't know."

"I want him to be, OK."

"Yeah, me too."

*

"Does anyone want to tell me what exactly had happened and why wasn't I informed about any exploration attempt?"

He could feel anger rising inside of him as he looked from one person to the other, noticing how everyone avoided his gaze. Volker was playing with the bandage on his shoulder, deciding that the floor was more interesting to look at, and Scot followed his example. At least Greer had the guts to look somewhere above Young's shoulder rather than his boots. "No one?"

"We were about to call you, sir, but we didn't have time - "

"It was a room, doctor Park," he cut in. "It would have still been there even hours later."

"It didn't look dangerous or anything," Volker grumbled, and Young couldn't help the angry note in his voice as he faced the other man.

"Well, doctor Volker, please tell that to three of my men currently lying unconscious or to doctor Rush for the matter."

The mention of the scientist caused the temperature to drop, making everyone look even more somber. Young didn't want to think about the Scotsman. The fact that they didn't know what he had done or more importantly, what the chair had done to him so he could stop the machines was giving the colonel a headache at best. It would be far better if the man would just wake up and complain about everything not lie deathly still. 

Young cleared his throat, realizing he had stayed silent for too long. "I want that room sealed. No one is to enter it under any circumstances."

"How are we to determinate what Rush had done if we can't go in there?"

"I was told you're a scientist or is the PhD in front of your name there by mistake? Figure it out."

He was really beyond caring at this point. Young didn't have anything more to say - he would have a word with Scot and Greer later on when the emotions wouldn't be running as high as now. He brushed past the others, entering the infirmary with a frown on his face. Why, just this once, couldn't it be a normal day?

At first glance, TJ was nowhere to be found, so he slowly made his way further into the room. If not at the front there would be one other place Tamara would be, one he didn't yet want to visit but was obligated to anyway. And sure enough, he had found her leaning over Rush's prone form, listening to his chest with a stethoscope. Not wanting to disturbed her, he stopped by the foot of the bed and glanced to the side.

A small smile curved the corner of his lips. Somehow he wasn't surprised to find miss Armstrong soundly asleep in the next bed. She didn't look wounded, more like exhausted.

"She fell asleep in the chair," TJ said, stopping next to him. "Eli moved her."

"She's alright?"

TJ nodded.

"Little traumatized, but physically unharmed. She's worried about Rush."

"No change?"

Instead of answering, TJ nodded her head to the side, stepping around him to a more private area, and he followed her without another word. She looked dead on her feet, and Young wanted so badly to gather her in his arms and hold her close, but he knew better. TJ wouldn't have wanted him to do that.

"There might be some swelling inside his brain, I'm not sure, but it looks like it."

"How sure can you be?"

She sighed and crossed her arms over her chest.

"He's got neck stiffness, well he's neck is chronically stiff but not like that. His breathing's irregular, and there was blood coming out of his ears. But without the proper equipment? I really don't know, sir."

"Did he wake up at all?"

"No, but he had been unconscious for three days after the last time he had sitten in the chair..."

"It was a different chair, though."

"And that's what's worrying me."

Young nodded then glanced back up at Tamara. She really did look terrible and in a desperate need of a rest.

"TJ?" She didn't react. Her gaze focused on the curtain, behind which laid Rush. "Hey, you ok?"

"Sorry, sir. It's just - "

"You're tired, that's alright. Go get some rest."

"I can't. Rush's still not stable enough, and if I'm right, and there is swelling to his brain then he could suffer a seizure or - "

"TJ, look at me," his hand on her shoulder did the trick, and she stilled, focusing back on Young's face. He forced a small smile to reassure her. "I can sit with him. I'll get you if anything happens, I promise."

"There's no need - "

"Yes, there is. You did a good job, lieutenant. And even if he'll get a seizure, I know how to deal with it, remember? Now go and rest. Don't make me say this as an order."

She smiled then, finally accepting, squeezing his arm as she passed him by. That was the final proof he had needed to know how tired she was. TJ wouldn't have touched him otherwise. Not anymore and maybe for the better.

Young waited till she disappeared through the door before making his way back towards Rush's bed. He grabbed the metal, uncomfortable chair that had been previously occupied by Chloe and dragged it carefully with him - close enough to be able to help when needed but not too near as not to look like he was praying on the other man. Crossing the arms over his chest, he watched as Rush's chest rose and fell with shuddering, uneven breaths that fogged the oxygen mask.

Typical - a whole team of scientists and the one who had saved the day had once again been Rush. Did the man had no preservation instinct and believed he had to do all by himself? Including putting his life in life for others? It was Young's and other soldiers' job to do those sort of calls, not civilians'. And yet again, when he had thought he had the other man all figured out, he had gone and done something like that.

A lot of work.

*

A sound of a violin.

A carefully practised and soft vibrato.

The bow moving across the strings producing the most beautiful yet haunting sound to his ears.

Soft and slow at first, entering a more melancholic and sad tone with each stroke of the bow against the strings. Getting louder and more desperate with every crescendo, to descend from the highest notes and start a soft tune again.

Low notes, resonating deeply within his soul. Why so sad? Why so desperate? It was like crying without the tears. But maybe he was wrong. The notes were the tears of the instrument, after all.

Piano Pianissimo. Creschedo. Mesoforte. Diminiuendo. 

And then, fortississimo. A quick succession of quarter notes fired rapidly like bullets from the rife, all played without a hitch in a sound.

He knew that piece. Had heard it many times and could recognize the hand that played it. She had that distinctive way of producing vibrato from both the wrist and the finger that he would recognize everywhere together with the quick way she was playing double stopping. 

He followed the sound, running around in the fog, not knowing where to go.  
It was dark, he couldn't see a thing, but he knew he was somewhere he wasn't supposed to be.

There should be no violin playing. Yet he could hear it clear as day. If the sound was real, it meant that she was also somewhere out there. Maybe all the years without her had been a dream?

The music was making him nervous, wanting to dig his fingers into his scalp and pull at his hair. Everywhere he turned Shostakovich's String Quartet No. 8 was getting louder and louder. 

"Gloria?!" 

She had to be here, she just had to. But where was here? Why she didn't answer?

The pressure build behind his eyes, bringing him to his knees just at the finish of the second movement. For a moment he was afraid he had suffered an aneurysm that's how great the pain was. And he kneeled panting and sweating, digging his palms into his eyes as sharp notes dug into his skull like needles. He needed to get out. From wherever he was, he needed to get out.

The third movement started, and like the mock waltz it was, it put him back on his feet and pulled towards the source. Closer with every shaky step, but still unsure. He couldn't see, couldn't feel, couldn't move on his own. He could just hear the sharp notes inviting him to lose his mind.

Gloria hated to play that piece. Too sad and even more depressing, she had said. But it had been the one she used to play when she had learned about her cancer. Why play it? Why was he the one hearing it?

A trick?

A simulation?

Why had he thought about a simulation?

What was going on?

He had calculations to run, classes to teach. He was about to take Gloria to the dinner finally after two months of her treatment. But maybe he had done all of it already. Or not at all. 

Why was he in a dark room with only her violin as a sole source of any stimuli?

 _When_ was he?

"Gloria?!"

No answer. Why wasn't she answering? Why there was an ugly sense of dread filling his insides with every low note? The tears falling from his eyes couldn't be his...

_You need to wake up, Nick._

He closed his eyes.

Wake...

And opened them to a blinding light and cold, metal digging into his back.

...Up.

Had he made it? The low sounds of the violin were still playing. Menacing. Forboding.

"Rush?"

He blinked two times, willing the room to focus. At fruitless task as he wasn't wearing his glasses. Had he fallen asleep with them on again and Gloria pulled them off his nose?

"Rush?"

That voice again. A little stronger than the music in his ears. Weird, maybe Gloria was in the other room then. He would have to wait for her to finish the piece. He groaned, trying to roll over on his side, but the sudden pain that flared in his sides and middle stopped his movement. What the hell had happened to him?

"Don't move, you'll tear your stitches."

Stitches? Why the hell did he need stitches? Where was Gloria?

The music was still playing.

"Calm down."

"Bugger off," he mumbled hoarsely. 

He screwed his eyes shut, breathing through his nose, willing the pain to lessen. It would all be well and good if his head didn't feel as if it was about to explode as well. The music had changed - when he couldn't tell, but it wasn't Shostakovich anymore. Was it Erst? He could swear it sounded like Der Erlkönig. Gloria's fingers would be hurting after playing it. They always did.

"Come on, Rush. Talk to me."

There were hands on his shoulders, pushing him back on the bed then hovering above him, uncertainly. He had a feeling he should know the voice speaking, but the name was running away from him like a wild rabbit when he tried to catch it.

"I'll get TJ. Don't move."

Like he could. He didn't want TJ or anyone for the matter. He wanted Gloria to finish playing and come to sit beside him, preferably with his glasses so he could see like a normal person again. He didn't even manage to complete that line of thought when someone shone a light into his eyes, blinding him. He sweated the offending thing aside with his hand, but it returned with determination he could admire at some point but right now despised with full force.

"Hold still."

"I will if you take that bloody thing off my face."

The light disappeared, and he sighed in relief. Blinking a few times, he found out his surroundings getting sharper with every blink. He still missed his glasses as there surely would be a headache coming if he didn't put them on his face soon, but it looked like he could finally more or less see.

Two people were standing right in front of him - a blond woman, who had seemed to be the one blinding him with a penlight a few moments before, and a short man with shaggy, black hair. Both of them wore what looked like a military uniform, and he frowned.

"Could you tell me your name?" The woman asked and his frowned deepened.

"Doctor Nicholas Rush. And who the hell are you?"

The two of them looked at each other with poorly concealed concern - well the man was better at hiding it, but Rusg was still able to notice the stiffening of his shoulders.

He was about to ask another question, was opening his mouth to just do so as the woman turned back towards him, but then the final notes of Erlkönig pierced his ears with a shuddering force. They entered his brain like icicles performing lobotomy and his back arched on the bed as seizures wrecked his body. 

He didn't feel his muscles spasming nor the hands holding him down. There was only light bursting behind his eyelids, and he knew no more. His final thought being of Gloria not being happy that he had probably overworked himself once again.


End file.
